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This article aims to analyse the relationship between the environmental, social and governance (ESG) score and the cost of capital of 600 large, mid and small capitalization companies across 17 countries that are component of the EURO STOXX 600 Index. By examining whether ESG has an impact on the cost of capital, this article contributes to the solutions to improve the impact of organizations and societies on sustainable development. The article further examines whether the effect is because of the environmental, social and/or governance components. In addition, the article analyses which WACC component (i.e. the cost of equity, the cost of debt, the beta or the leverage ratio) is affected. Furthermore, this article analyses whether a high ESG score can substitute for a weaker legal environment.

The results were obtained by using ordinary least squares panel data modelling to analyse the relationship between the ESG score and the cost of capital. The sample consists of companies that are part of the STOXX Europe 600 Index over the period 2018–2021, which is composed of 600 companies, including large, mid and small capitalization firms listed across 17 countries. The sample finally includes 1,960 firm-year observations.

Companies with a higher ESG score tend to have a lower cost of capital, but this relationship holds only for firms domiciled in countries with a weaker legal environment. In addition, these firms should not only increase their ESG score to create a more sustainable environment but also to reduce their cost of debt. Environmental and social factors have a significantly negative impact on the cost of capital only in countries with a weaker legal environment, while the governance component positively impacts the cost of capital by allowing firms to borrow more.

There is not yet a standardized taxonomy to define ESG, making the study dependent on commercial data providers.

The new insights can be used by companies domiciled in countries with weaker legal environments to reduce their cost of capital. The results also allow us to know on which components of the ESG score to focus. It can also help policymakers, specifically those in countries with a weaker legal environment, to provide incentives to further stimulate ESG investments and disclosure, thereby contributing to a more sustainable society.

To achieve the sustainable development goals put forward by the United Nations, it is important for firms to invest in ESG projects. It is nevertheless insightful to know whether these ESG investments, which are currently observed as a cost, also provide benefits to firms and in which countries. If firms clearly see the advantages of investing in ESG projects, they are likely to proactively engage in them.

This article is the first, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, to focus on 17 European countries, thereby capturing divergent legal environments. This setting allows us to answer the main novel research question, namely, whether the ESG score can act as a substitute for the legal environment in which the company is domiciled. The article also goes further than previous articles by examining whether the effect is because of the environmental, social and/or governance component and whether these impact the components of the weighted cost of capital, namely, the cost of equity, the cost of debt, the beta or the leverage ratio of the companies.

The purpose of the study is to examine the impact of corporate reputation (hereafter CR) and the degree of economic development on firms’ cost of capital remains unresolved. This study addresses these issues.

Using a global sample across 20 countries, the study investigates the discrete and joint effects of CR and jurisdictional economic development on the cost of equity (COE) and cost of debt (COD) capital. The analysis encompasses a dual data set, comprising 1,308 observations for COE and 1,223 observations for COD, allowing for a comprehensive exploration of these dynamics.

The findings indicate that CR leads to a reduction in the cost of capital for reputable firms. Nevertheless, the extent of this decrease varies per type of capital and firm’s reputation level and is contingent upon the economic development level within the firm’s jurisdiction. Particularly noteworthy is the moderating effect of economic development on CR, which shows that COE capital tends to be lower for reputable firms operating in economically developed jurisdictions. Albeit, this is not the case for COD capital for reputable firms in similarly developed jurisdictions.

This study illustrates that effective CR management, aimed at reducing the cost of capital, necessitates a combination of the firm’s unique competitive advantage and the economic development context of its jurisdiction to truly achieve its intended goal.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first global study to explore the impact of CR on both COE and COD capital. Furthermore, this study is primarily towards understanding the moderating role of economic development in the relationship between CR and cost of capital.

This paper contributes to the existing literature by extending the empirical work on the relationship between corporate governance and capital structure by analyzing the mediating role of cost of capital in the non-financial firms listed on the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX).

The sample for this study includes non-financial firms listed on the Pakistan Stock Exchange (formerly Karachi Stock Exchange) for the period of 2004–2016. Based on 1800 firm-year observations, three approaches of panel data analysis are applied for the step-wise analysis of the underlying study. Firstly, Pooled OLS is applied. Secondly, fixed and random effect panel regression followed by the Hausman test to check the unobservable individual heterogeneity of the data. Hausman test indicates that the fixed-effects model is the most appropriate model for the sample panel data.

The study's findings are that board size, board composition, CEO/Chair duality, institutional ownership and managerial ownership have statistically significant direct effect on the firm's financing decisions. However, CEO/Chair duality, institutional ownership and managerial ownership have significant indirect effect on firm's capital structure decisions. The interesting finding of the paper is on the evidence of mediating role of cost of capital in the nexus of corporate governance and capital structure. Moreover, some conventional determinants of capital structure, including the firm's size, asset structure of the firm, profitability, business risk and growth, are found as determinants of capital structure decisions of the firms.

There are a few limitations to our study which could be addressed by upcoming research. We did not include all the four mechanisms of corporate governance including board structure, audit structure, compensation structure and ownership structure. However, we used only five important attributes including board size, board composition and CEO/Chair duality form board structure, managerial ownership and institutional ownership form ownership structure of corporate governance as our explanatory variables to examine their impact on the capital structure choices of the firms. Future studies may fill this research gap by involving some other attributes of corporate governance and analyzing their effectiveness and impact on value relevant capital structure decisions. Further, due to limited time and resources, we only tested the mediating role of cost of capital, hence, future researchers can analyze the mediating and moderating roles of different variables which may influence the relationship between corporate governance and capital structure choices of the firms.

The study has many valuable guidelines and practical implications for the financial managers of the corporations. Our results will facilitate the policymakers in setting their corporate governance policies and practices and making the value relevant capital structure decisions in compliance with the implications of corporate governance mechanism. In addition, our study provides the empirical evidence in accordance with the argument that good governance practices, particularly the voluntary disclosures by the firm may reduce the information asymmetry which, ultimately, reduces the agency cost and the cost of capital for the firm. However, while deciding the financial policy of the corporations, managers can use our findings in order to assess the effectiveness of corporate governance practices employed by the firm in achieving the optimal capital structure at which the weighted average cost of capital is at its minimum level.

This paper contributes to the literature by investigating the mediating role of the cost of capital in the relationship between corporate governance and capital structure decisions of the firms. This paper provides empirical evidence that corporate governance indirectly affects capital structure decisions through the mediating role of cost of capital.

This study aims to investigate the effect of ESG controversies and their moderating role in ESG performance and the cost of equity and overall, short-term and long-term debt capital relationship in European listed companies.

The study employs two-way fixed effects panel linear regression models on the balanced longitudinal dataset of 231 European non-financial companies listed in the MSCI Europe Index in 2017–2022. To check the robustness, the study utilises the fixed effects logistic regression models with heteroskedasticity-consistent standard errors.

The study reveals the significant effect of ESG performance (negative) and ESG controversies (negative) on the cost of debt capital and the substantial moderating effect of ESG controversies (positive). Additionally, it provides empirical evidence of the crossover moderating effect of ESG controversies in ESG performance and cost of equity relationship.

The findings contribute to corporate practice and empirically support legitimacy and stakeholder theories.

Companies can utilise the results to proactively enhance their internal policies and behaviour to align with ESG practices and avoid ESG controversies, which will translate into reduced equity capital costs for shareholders and a lower cost of debt capital charged by creditors.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to comprehensively investigate the influence of ESG controversies and their moderating effect in the context of the equity and debt capital cost for European listed companies.

In the current study, corporate investment is examined by using a user cost of capital model for two important Latin American economies: Brazil and Mexico. In this paper, a dynamic user cost of capital model is employed. The extended model also accounts the investment model with the convex adjustment cost. Moreover, the link between structural change, financial liberalization and investment is also investigated. The present study, therefore, sheds new lights on the investment behavior of the Latin American emerging markets.

The differenced generalized method of moments approach is employed to control the endogeneity, heteroscedasticity and autocorrelation for modeling the corporate investment over 20 years for both countries.

The findings indicate that the dynamic user cost of capital-based investment model explains the corporate investment in Brazil and Mexico. Especially, the interest rate and depreciation explain the investment behavior of nonfinancial firms in both countries. At the same time, structural change and financial liberalization do not have a significant impact on interest rates, an important user cost of capital.

This is the first study examines the corporate investment using dynamic user costs of capital approach for an emerging market. The user cost of capital-based investment models is clearly understudied models for emerging markets. This study is particularly important for emerging markets as investment models need to have a theoretical background.

En el presente estudio se examina la inversión empresarial utilizando un modelo de coste de capital del usuario para dos importantes economías latinoamericanas: Brasil y México. En este trabajo se emplea un modelo dinámico de coste de capital para el usuario. El modelo ampliado también tiene en cuenta el modelo de inversión con el coste de ajuste convexo. Además, se investiga la relación entre el cambio estructural, la liberalización financiera y la inversión. El presente estudio, por tanto, arroja nueva luz sobre el comportamiento de la inversión en los mercados emergentes latinoamericanos.

Se emplea el método GMM diferenciado para controlar la endogeneidad, la heteroscedasticidad y la autocorrelación en la modelización de la inversión empresarial a lo largo de 20 años en ambos países.

Los resultados indican que el modelo dinámico de inversión basado en el coste de capital para el usuario explica la inversión empresarial en Brasil y México. Especialmente, el tipo de interés y la depreciación explican el comportamiento de la inversión de las empresas no financieras en ambos países. Al mismo tiempo, se constata que el cambio estructural y la liberalización financiera no tienen un efecto significativo sobre los tipos de interés, que es un importante coste de uso del capital.

Este es el primer estudio que examina la inversión empresarial utilizando un enfoque dinámico basado en los costes de capital para un mercado emergente. Los modelos de inversión basados en los costes de uso del capital son claramente modelos poco estudiados para los mercados emergentes. Este estudio es especialmente importante para los mercados emergentes, ya que los modelos de inversión deben tener un trasfondo teórico.

Studies on sustainable finance examine how it is interrelated with economic, social, governance and environmental issues. Using financial data on publicly traded firms in Indonesia, this study aims to explore the interplay between the cost of capital, firm performance and the COVID-19 pandemic.

This study uses firm-level data sets of publicly listed firms from 2012 to 2021. The regression analysis reported in the study includes the Driscoll–Kraay estimator, propensity score matching model and fixed-effects regression.

The study revealed three significant findings. First, on average, non-environmental, social and governance (ESG) companies’ cost of capital is lower than that of ESG firms. Second, ROE in ESG enterprises is significantly impacted by capital costs. Third, the cost of capital has a negative impact on the market value (Tobin’s q) of non-ESG firms. The study specifically shows that after accounting for the pandemic, ESG firms did not benefit during the troubled COVID-19 crisis after controlling for the pandemic dummy years of 2020 and 2021. These results indicate that the adoption of green or sustainable finance is still in its infancy and that the sector requires more time to establish an enabling environment.

This study benefits from capital structure and ESG theories. It supports the argument that the debt utilization ratio is still relevant to a company’s value because it affects its financial performance. Moreover, adopting ESG principles helps businesses survive crises. Thus, the analysis confirms the superiority of ESG-based firms.

This study draws two conclusions. First, the results could be a reference for academics and practitioners to understand the effect of pandemic-related crises on a firm’s capital structure and performance. In terms of survival during a crisis, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, this study demonstrates how firms with strong ESG may perform differently than those without ESG. Second, this study supports the need for an empirical study and examination of the development of sustainable finance in the country while considering setbacks.

The results should be of interest to policymakers who focus on the ESG market and academics conducting ESG-related research on emerging markets.

This study contributes to the literature by establishing empirical evidence on the relationship between the cost of capital and firm performance of ESG- and non-ESG-rated enterprises in the Indonesian setting while controlling for the impact of the pandemic.

The authors measure the cost of equity to earnings yield differential for a sample of 2,035 non-financial firms. In a series of Logit and Tobit regressions, the authors examine if the cost of equity to earnings yield differential is related to dividend policy in the manner predicted by agency theory.

Agency theory says a firm's optimal dividend policy is partially determined by the relationship between the earnings yield and the cost of equity capital. When the cost of equity is higher (lower) than the earnings yield, firms are motivated to (not) pay dividends as this reduces the cost of capital and holding other things constant, increases corporate valuations. The authors test whether managers set dividend policies to maximize the value of the firm.

The study’s findings show that when the cost of equity is higher (lower) than earnings yield, firms are more (less) likely to be dividend payers and the payouts are higher (lower). The results are robust to the inclusion of share repurchases as an alternative to cash distributions. The study’s findings support the cost of equity hypothesis and are consistent with alternative dividend theories.

The study’s findings support the cost of equity hypothesis and are consistent with alternative dividend theories. To the authors’ knowledge, this is the first paper testing the cost of equity hypothesis.

The purpose of this study is to examine the interplay between integrated reporting quality (IRQ) and capital markets. More specifically, the authors test the impact of IRQ on stock liquidity, cost of capital and analyst forecast accuracy.

The sample consists of listed firms on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange in South Africa, covering the period from 2012 to 2020. The IRQ measure used in this study is based on data from Ernst and Young. To test the proposed hypotheses, the authors conducted a generalized least squares regression analysis.

The empirical results evince a positive relationship between IRQ and stock liquidity. However, the authors did not find a significant effect of IRQ on the cost of capital and financial analysts’ forecast accuracy. In robustness tests, it was shown that firms with a higher IRQ score exhibit higher liquidity and improved analyst forecast accuracy. Additional analysis indicates a negative association between IRQ and the cost of capital, as well as a positive association between IRQ and financial analyst forecast accuracy for firms with higher IRQ scores (TOP ten, Excellent, Good).

The study stands as one of the initial endeavors to investigate the impact of IRQ on the capital market. It provides valuable insights for managers and policymakers who are interested in enhancing disclosure practices within the financial market. Furthermore, these findings are significant for investors as they make informed investment decisions.

This study examines the connection between investor sentiment and corporate innovation in the United States, considering the magnitude of corporate information asymmetry, the implied cost of capital and the financial constraints.

The authors employ a two-step GMM framework to examine the hypotheses of this study by utilizing annual data from 2001 to 2021 for US corporations.

The empirical evidence demonstrates a significant impact of investor sentiment on corporate innovation for firms with a lower information asymmetry and implied cost of capital than those with a higher information asymmetry and cost of capital. Although the financial constraint channel remained positive, it had little impact on the innovations of US corporations. Overall, the study's results show that companies make more valuable and high-quality patents when investors are optimistic.

This research has policy implications for all managers, investors, analysts and state officers, particularly in the USA and other developed countries. Managers and investors of all types should predict the role of corporate innovation in increasing shareholder wealth.

To the authors' knowledge, this is the first study to examine the relationship between investor sentiment and corporate innovation in the United States, considering the extent of corporate information asymmetry, the implied cost of capital and the financial limitations. The study's empirical findings uniquely contribute to the existing literature on corporate innovation and investor sentiment in the current context.

This study aims to explore the relationship between firm risk, capital structure, cost of equity capital and social and environmental sustainability during the COVID-19 pandemic for companies listed on Tehran Stock Exchange.

To this aim, the information about 190 companies in 2014–2020 was retrieved to be analyzed. The total risk and systematic risk were used as the indicators of company risk; the industry-adjusted earnings price ratio (IndEP) and GORDON were used for the cost of equity capital. To measure social sustainability and environmental sustainability, the procedure suggested by Arianpoor and Salehi (2020) was used.

Underleveraged firms have had a lower total risk during the COVID-19 pandemic, while overleveraged firms have not had a higher risk during this time. In overleveraged firms, using systematic risk has a negative impact on social sustainability during the COVID-19 pandemic. In overleveraged firms, using total risk and systematic risk has a significant negative impact on environmental sustainability in the pandemic. Besides, overleveraged firms have a lower cost of equity capital (IndEP) during COVID-19.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, no similar study has so far examined the joint impact of COVID-19 and corporate risk on social and environmental sustainability and also the joint impact of COVID-19 and capital structure on the cost of equity. This study contributes to the related literature by providing corporations with insightful post-pandemic directions on capital structure decisions and social and environmental activities. Furthermore, this research and the relevant findings can help understand and develop social responsibility in Iran as a developing country.